All posts by reneeinnd

2026, animals, Family, Uncategorized

Hogwash

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Last Friday evening, our son drove into Brookings to put air in the tires of his wife’s car. They live in a small town several miles east of Brookings. There are three roads that go between the towns. Two are nicely paved. The third is paved, albeit poorly. with some patches of gravel here and there. The county ran out of money this summer to pave the entire route. There are lots of farm trucks on it.

On the way back home on the partially paved road, Son drove through a very large puddle on the road. It was several inches deep. When he got home he parked the car in the garage and noticed a very horrible smell. He said if the temperature had been any higher in the garage he might have fainted from the stench. The sides of the car and the tires were covered with a black, tarry substance.

He tried wiping off what he could, and then took the car through the car wash. 5 times. He got most of it off, but it still was sort of smelly. He used an enzymatic cleaner to get any remaining crud out from between the doors and the door frame. It took him most of the weekend to get the car cleaned.

He consulted with a friend who grew up on a farm who thought the offending substance had come from a truck hauling liquid hog manure. Son says he has a new appreciation for the word “hogwash”.

What words have you come to appreciate lately? What’s the biggest mess you have had to clean up? Any experiences with hogs?

2026, gardening, History, Travel, Uncategorized

Savannah Gardens

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Today’s post comes from Jacque.

April 14-18 this year (2026) my dear friend Tracy and I took off for a Savannah, Georgia Garden Tour. After returning home I intended to submit a blog about it, because we saw so many interesting Gardens and sites. Hmmm. What happened? So here it is (now that husband’s medical difficulties stabilized, I will start to work on one about Northern Ireland. )

We travelled to Savannah the weekend of April 16-20 to stay just south of the iconic Forsyth Park in a VRBO apartment that was beautiful, and up 3 flights of creaky stairs. Once up there we had a deck shaded by a tulip tree. It was quiet and lovely.

Forsyth Park Fountain

Creaky Stairs

Front of apartment

The garden tour is organized by the North of Gaston (NOG) Garden Club of Savannah. ere is the website. They host one every spring. I see that soon the 2027 tickets will be on sale:

The Garden Club of Savannah NOGS Tour of Hidden Gardens 2026

It attracts thousands of visitors and is walkable. We started with the garden nearest to us at a mansion featured as a law office in the movie Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. It is in reality a single man’s home.

Tracy and I in the first garden

Statue of naked lady

Most of the gardens were walled and very small, with every inch covered in patio or plants. It took two days to get to all thirteen gardens, walking through the graceful neighborhoods to get from one to the other. Unfortunately, the two days of the tour were unusually hot, 94° each day.

Jones Street of the idiom “Keeping up with the Joneses

Mossy Chair

Walled Garden

Relics and cannon ball

The most interesting garden was on Jones Street. The townhouse there had been remodelled and updated in the 1990’s. During the excavations of the garden the relics were brought up: the pottery and glass shards were not a surprise, but the cannon ball held by the red armed figure was a great surprise. They did not know the cannon ball was still live, so the entire street was evacuated. The examination of the cannon ball showed it was from the Civil Ware era. It was not live, so the homeowner kept it as a novelty. The family had remodeled the stable and tiny “Slave Quarters ” above it as a rental.

We dined at a local lunch spot one noon where we found a wedding shower in progress. Everyone attending had to wear a hat. This was my favorite:

What strange things have you found in your yard?

2026, Food, Uncategorized

Read The Label Carefully

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Our new freezer is working splendidly. It is bigger than the old one, and much easier to see what is stored therein. Husband and I realized after transferring things to the new freezer that we had far too many frozen leftover dinner entrees and we decided to cut back on our cooking and make finishing off the leftovers a priority.

We are usually pretty good at labeling foods we freeze by writing the name of the foods on the lid of the container using a permanent marker. It isn’t the best method, since the older lids have multiple names on them. I try to cross out the old names before I write a new one.

This week I chose three containers of leftovers to finish off. One was labeled “Cuban Black Beans”. One was labeled “Rare Lamb Roast”. The last one had “Green Chili Chicken” written on the lid. As they thawed I checked to make certain the labels reflected what was in the containers. They seemed to match.

Husband heated up some of the chicken for dinner on Monday. We were looking forward to some Southwest food, and had heated up some corn to accompany it. It was quite a shock to find that the chicken bundles topped with what I thought was tomatillo chili sauce were really haddock-stuffed cabbage rolls with dill cream sauce (Fischrouladen), a Northern German dish. The coarse mustard in the sauce looked just like tomatillo seeds. It tasted really good, though.

We bought some freezer tape to put on container lids so that we can write the contents on the tape instead of the lid. That may help reduce the confusion of our leftover’s identity. In a few days I will pull some more leftovers out of the freezer. I hope there aren’t any surprises.

How carefully do you read food labels when you shop?Many Unidentified Frozen Objects in your freezer? How do you manage leftovers?

2026, home, Uncategorized

Appliance Woes

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Husband and I inherited a rather old but serviceable upright freezer from the former owners of our house when we moved to Luverne. It was a Kenmore brand. (The former owners once owned the local Sears store.) It was probably 15+ years old.

Its motor/fan ran continuously no matter what the temperature was set at. It froze things well, though. We brought a large upright freezer with us from ND when we moved. Given the way we cook, garden, and grocery shop, it is essential that we have at least two freezers in addition to the smaller one in the fridge.

I had been watching the old freezer closely, given its age, and noticed immediately last week when the fan just stopped working. After I unplugged and plugged it in again and turned the temperature control around a couple of times the fan started in again. Nothing had thawed. I knew this was a bad omen, though, so Husband and I went to our local appliance store in the morning. Yes, they had just the upright freezer we needed. Yes, they could deliver it. Would it work if they delivered it immediately? They were having a slow morning at the store. We had to race home to get there before the appliance guy did! I am glad we didn’t lose any food in the freezer and had ample time to get the new freezer cold before we emptied the old one. The appliance guy came the next day to haul away the old one.

The new freezer works well and is much bigger than the old one. This is the fourth major appliance we have replaced since we moved. There aren’t many aged appliances left here. I am happy the furnaces and A/C units are much newer. (We have two of each due to the building of an addition to the house several years ago.) I really don’t want any more major appliance expenditures for a while.

Any memorable appliance woes for you? Remember chest freezers? How many freezers do you have?

2026, Art, Family, Uncategorized

Art Class

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I wrote last week about my anxiety about participating in an art class at a local studio here. Well, my worries were for naught. The Raku class was fun, and far easier than I imagined.

The class was taught by a local artist who makes a lot of pottery. He is a retired electician who teaches how to be an electrician at a nearby technical college. He gives all sorts of art classes at his studio, which is in an enormous barn on a former horse farm just outside of town, and was filled with paints, glazes, potters wheels, kilns, etc.

We had to choose a pre-cast figure to glaze. I chose a dragon and decided if it turned out I would give it to my grandson. Boommate chose a vase. We were given a wide variety of glazes to choose from. I chose two glazes that were supposed to turn multiple colors. Some glazes were just single colors. We had to give the figures two coats of glaze. It dried really fast so we could fo two coats in quick succession. There were about 12 people in the class, including teens and adults. Many had been to his classes before.

The figures were fired in a kiln set to 1850°. There was fire shooting out of the top of the kiln. As they finished firing, the figures were placed in buckets, and we had to throw pieces of paper on them, which burst into flame and did something to the glaze finish. When they were a liitle cooler and the paper was all burned they were hosed down with cold water. Then we had to scrub them with soap and abrasive cleanser to remove any ash.

You can see my dragon in the header photo. My lack of artistic talent is well known in the family. Daughter commented “YOU painted THAT?!!” when she saw the photo. I am pretty proud of it. Boommate and I decided we will probably go to a winter class.

What have you made that makes you the proudest? What is your favorite kind of art?

2026, Family, Health, History, Uncategorized

Traits

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Quite a few years ago I had DNA testing through Ancestry. Over the years there have been reanalyses of results. I believe it has become more accurate, and the area of my Europe my ancestors are from matches family history and lore. Both sides of my family come from northern Germany and the Netherlands. We are North Sea/Baltic Sea people. There is absolutely no evidence that my father’s family is French. That is a long held family myth. They are Dutch and Ostfriesian. My mother’s people come from the area around Hamburg and Bremen, and Schwerin, a town in northern Mecklenburg.

Every so often I get new results from Ancestry regarding DNA linked traits that I might possess. I don’t know how much I believe in the accuracy of the results, nor do I know how the results were derived, but some are spot on. I just don’t know how DNA influences them. For example, just last week I learned I had a new trait, that of not liking scary movies. Well, I really dislike scary movies. My mom didn’t like them either.

Some of the traits I allegedly possess that are consistent with my experiences are being likely to drink caffeine beverages, having good eye-hand coordination, being unable to smell asparagus metabolites, being unlikely to enjoy watching sports, enjoying cilantro, being likely to get cavities, having high pain tolerance, and being able to wiggle my ears.

According to my Ancestry DNA analysis I am unlikely to go grey early and unlikely to have pets. Well, neither of those are accurate for me. I started going grey in my 30’s, and I have had pets all my life.

I take the trait reports with a grain of salt. I think we have more free will regarding how we function than our DNA dictates. Nature vs nurture is hard to discern. I am often sarcastically thanked by our children for giving them my gene for Generalized Anxiety Disorder. I think I would rather say it was in the DNA, and not how I raised them .

What traits do you possess that you think are inherited? What did your upbringing contribute? Can you wiggle your ears?

2026, Family, Gatherings, History, Uncategorized

St. Dysmas

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Our church participates in the St. Dysmas ministry at the South Dakota State Penitentiary in Sioux Falls. This is a ministry focused on prison inmates. Our church sends parishioners to the prison for services. St. Dysmas was the name given to the prisoner crucified on the right side of Jesus who repented of his crimes.

Husband is interested in participating in this ministry. In order to do so he has to submit a quarterly background check request. His record is blameless, but the authorities may have some issues with his wife’s last name.

In May, 1991, my father was asked to give a lecture on becoming a sports official and the intricacies of being a referree, to prisoners at the SD Penitentiary. He gave his lecture to about 30 male prisoners. It went well, he thought, and he gathered up his things and left. Within minutes after his departure there was a very serious prison-wide riot. He wasn’t blamed for the riot, but I imagine his name was mentioned in the report on the riot.

Dad’s friends thought the timing of his lecture and the riot was hilarious, and teased him about it with great relish. There wasn’t any connection between Dad and the riot, but was a pretty interesting coincidence. I worry that if Husband has to list my last name on his background check, he may get turned down for participation in the St. Dysmas program.

Ever been in a riot? Ever visited a prison? What might you like to give a lecture on, and to who?

2026, Art, education, Uncategorized

Community Education

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I must confess I am somewhat anxious for Saturday when I am attending the first art class I will have been to since high school. I took art history in college. I loved it. I hated every art class I had to take in Grades K-12 that involved creating art.

We had good art teachers in our public school. I simply have no talent for drawing or painting. My handwriting is awful. It is even a chore for me to do special decorations on cookies or cakes. We have a very active Communuty Education program here that teaches everything from seed saving to toddler management to learning MahJong to making your own bath bombs. There also are art classes, and Boommate strong armed me into taking a Raku class with her this Saturday. I think it only involves choosing a pre-made piece of pottery bisque and painting it to be fired. I think I can handle that.

In December I am also signed up with her to take a class in which we will create acrylic paintings. It is being held in the high school art room. If it is the same art room from when I was in school, I will probably have nightmares. I would much rather take a class in toddler management!

What does your town offer for Community Education? Ever taken any classes? What were your most and least favorite classes in high school?

2026, Family, gardening, History, home, Nature, Uncategorized

Raking Leaves

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Where is it written that people have to rake the leaves off of their lawns every fall, so that no leaves remain? We have neighbors here in MN and had neighbors in ND who worked daily in the fall to remove any traces of leaves. We are not raking people.

In our ND town the City was of no help to people who needed leaves hauled away. People had to haul them away to the landfill themselves. Of course, this was the City that wouldn’t remove snow from residential streets unless 4 or more inches had fallen. (It’s going to melt eventually anyway, and we don’t have it in our budget to plow anything but major arteries.)

Luverne has a much different attitude about this. I attribute it to the proximity to Northwest Iowa and a Dutch influence regarding neatness. The other day while it was raining we saw several street sweeping machines washing streets. The City sends out leaf suckeruppers several days in October and November to remove leaves that residents have swept into the gutter. Snow of any amount is also plowed up.

We like to leave the leaves for ground cover and pollinators. We sweep up leaves that collect on the sidewalk or deck, though. I remember the smell of burning leaves in the fall when I was a child, and loved it when my mom and dad would make leaf piles for me to jump in. Leaf burning is illegal now, I think. I am glad we have better things to do now than rake.

What are your leaf raking, leaf jumping memories? Are you a raker?

2026, Family, Kids, Music, Theatre, Uncategorized

12 Incompetent Jurors

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Boommate and I were driving past the high school yesterday on our way back home from exercise class when we noticed an ad for the upcoming high school fall play 12 Incompetent Jurors.

We both thought it would be a fun play to see. I looked it up when we got home. It is a parody of 12 Angry Men and is about the jury deliberations in a case in which a man has confessed to stealing a number of cats. One of the Jurors doubts the facts in the case and holds out on a guilty verdict. Chaos apparently ensues.

I never was in plays in musicals in high school, although I was on the speech team and gave dramatic interpretations of Anna Christie and Long Days Journey Into Night. As a musician I was in the pit orchestra for Li’l Abner, The Music Man, and Bye Bye Birdie. I was too introverted to try out for a role in the non-musical productions. Looking back, I regret that. Our children were braver. Our son was a dancing/ singing cowboy in Oklahoma and our daughter was one of the wives in The King and I in high school.

Were you in plays or musicals in high school or college? Do you attend productions at your local high school? If you could go back in time, what role would you want in a play or musical?